Sabin wrote:Tony Richardson did a series of high profile foreign productions that put him on the radar before winning for Tom Jones, but he was not working in the States.

But he was. He directed no less than eight high profile plays on Broadway beginning with Look Back in Anger in 1957. He had also directed the Broadway versions of The Entertainer and A Taste of Honey before he directed the film versions. At the time of his Oscar win, his produciton of Luther with Albert finney was still running on Broadway and he had already been married to Vanessa Redgrave whose sister Lynn was one of the bright discoeries of Tom Jones. He had also directed William Faulknor's Sanctuary for Fox on location in the Deep South. He was as famous a director as Elia Kazan was when he won his first Oscar.

“‎Life is a shipwreck, but we must not forget to sing in the lifeboats.” - Voltaire

Mister Tee wrote:Tony Richardson had some stage credits, a la Sam Mendes -- thos of us who followed NY theatre knew his name.

Actually Richardson had 5 films to his credit before winning his Oscar for Tom Jones. His first film was the screen adaptation of Look Back in Anger (with Richard Burton) followed by other screen adaptations of acclaimed or well known stage productions in both London and New York - The Entertainer (for which Laurence Olivier was nominated for an Oscar) and A Taste of Honey. His other two films before his Oscar win were Sanctuary (with Yves Montand and Lee Remick) and The Loneliness of a Long Distance Runner (with Tom Courtenay).

I would say that Michel Hazanavicius is the least known Oscar winner within the industry as well as the general public.

While not very well known to the public, Michael Cimino was apparently some sort of child prodigy. Although he studied architecture, he had become by 1963 a high profile director of TV commercials - Kool Cigarettes; Eastman Kodak; United Airliens; Pepsi - his direction of a United Airlines ad that makes use of the pop song "Come Fly With Me" is legendary. Dino DeLaurentis offered him the chance to direct feature films around this time, but he turned him down. It was Clint Eastwood who convinced him to direct Thunderbolt and Lightfoot. Happy with the experience, as writer/producer of The Deer Hunter , he in essence hired himself to direct.

Delbert Mann was one of the pioneer TV directors who worked steadily in the medium from 1949. Burt Lancaster and his producing partner Harold Hecht hired him to direct Marty having directed the landmark 1953 TV version with Rod Steiger. Although he never won further recognition from the Academy he was subsequently nominated six more times by the DGA and received two honorary awards from them.

John G. Avildsen, while not unknown, did not have a very distinguished career before winning forRocky. He did direct Jack Lemmon to an Oscar for Save the Tiger but Lemmon was the driving force behind tht film. Writer/star Sylvester Stallone may well ahve been the real auteur of Rocky.

“‎Life is a shipwreck, but we must not forget to sing in the lifeboats.” - Voltaire

Trying to apply some kind of measurable criteria to it – Cimino, obscure as he might have been, had an Oscar recognition attached to his filmography prior to TDH via Bridges nomination for T&L. It's obvious Mendes or Delbert Mann, who won for their film debut, didn't have this kind of pedigree prior to their wins, and there must have been quite a few more directors whose first brush with the Oscars was their victorious one, but it's interesting to see if there ever were directors whose films, beyond the one they won for, never got any further recognition by the academy.

Not like it's a huge deal but Anthony Minghella wrote and directed Truly, Madly, Deeply which is a pretty wonderful piece of work, and in my opinion Minghella never topped it.

Kind of a shame. Minghella was a very talented guy who got a little too tangled up in white elephants and apparently was starting to emerge from it with whatever that Jude Law movie was that I never saw.

"If you are marching with white nationalists, you are by definition not a very nice person. If Malala Yousafzai had taken part in that rally, you'd have to say 'Okay, I guess Malala sucks now.'" ~ John Oliver

You got in before I could, Sabin. I'd agree Cimino is the greatest pre-Oscar obscurity. When word about The Deer Hunter started to emerge, most of us had to scramble to figure out who this guy was. (Thunderbolt and Lightfoot may seem like more a prestige credit today than it did then; Eastwood at that point was just a box-office star with a small auteurist push -- nothing like the icon he is today) And, of course, unto obscurity he did return.

Minghella was pretty much in Hooper territory as well; he'd done some of the well-liked Inspector Morse episodes for BBC, but his name wasn't known at all.

Avildsen was (and remained) a journeyman, but he did have some name recognition because Joe was a box-office and critical success in 1970.

Friedkin's The Night They Raided Minsky's got a little attention -- certainly more than his Sonny & Cher movie, Good Times, or his Pinter adaptation -- but The Boys in the Band was the only movie of his that carried any critical heft. (And it of course was no preparation for the blockbuster style of The French Connection)

Tony Richardson had some stage credits, a la Sam Mendes -- thos of us who followed NY theatre knew his name.

Michael Cimino co-wrote Silent Running and Magnum Force and then wrote and directed Thunderbolt and Lightfoot before making The Deer Hunter. That's a pretty seismic leap forward. He was also a pretty busy industry rewriter, I believe.

John G. Avildsen was a busy journeyman filmmaker, more anonymous than unknown.

William Friedkin did The Boys in the Band and a few projects I've never heard of before The French Connection.

Tony Richardson did a series of high profile foreign productions that put him on the radar before winning for Tom Jones, but he was not working in the States.

Delbert Mann's first feature was Marty. I believe he did a lot of television work. He's closer to Hopper than Hazanavicius.

"If you are marching with white nationalists, you are by definition not a very nice person. If Malala Yousafzai had taken part in that rally, you'd have to say 'Okay, I guess Malala sucks now.'" ~ John Oliver

I have an odd question concerning the known status of Best Director winners prior to their wins: Is Michel Hazanavicius the first Best Directing winner that is almost completely unknown to the common person prior to his film growing into an Oscar winner? I understand on a more international scale, his OSS 117 films must have been popular, but to most American audiences, they were relatively obscure titles. Would Sam Mendes (being a first time director, excluding his extensive stage work) or Anthony Minghella be the next in line? At least Tom Hooper had John Adams, Elizabeth I and a Prime Suspect episode.

Hugo is the biggest tech-only (= no Top 8 ) winner since Star Wars, who won six.It is the second biggest tech-only winner in Oscar history, as there are lots of movies with four Oscars, like recently The Matrix and many Spielberg movies, but only Hugo managed to get five, just behind the all-time champion's six.

The most remarkable thing about Meryl Streep's win is that it breaks the longest losing streak among actors in Oscar history. The Iron Lady was her thirteenth nomination since Sophie's Choice. It breaks another record long held by Kathaine Hepburn whose second Oscar for Guess Who's Coming to Dinner was on her ninth nomination since her previous win for Morning Glory.

Her next film from her Devil Weras Prada director called Great Hope Springs doesn't sound like an Oscar calibre film, but if it is, and the competition is weak she could tie another Hepburn record - consecutive Best Actress wins at the end of her long dry spell. More like, though, she'll be in serious contention the following year with the long delayed August: Osage County. If she for both, of course, she will have set a new record of becoming the first performer to win three years in succession.

“‎Life is a shipwreck, but we must not forget to sing in the lifeboats.” - Voltaire

Here's one you won't find anywhere else: Of this year's new winners and/or nominees, there's at least one born in every month of the year from January through December. Pretty good odds it could happen with so many new nominees, but it's an interesting tidbit if nothing else.

Wesley Lovell

"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both." - Benjamin Franklin